WHAT ARMENIAN VOTERS WANT: NO POLICY PROPOSALS, PLEASE
Gayane Abrahamyan
EurasiaNet, NY
April 25 2007
Do ideas count in Armenia’s May 12 parliamentary vote? The answer
appears to be no.
The unfulfilled promises of previous campaigns have left a large
segment of the Armenian electorate feeling disillusioned. Pollsters,
candidates and voters all state that handouts and free pop concerts
are doing more to sway attitudes about a particular party or candidate
than are specific policy proposals. Many Armenians, in fact, joke that
a prize should be given to anyone who can find five differences between
the platforms of the 24 parties competing for parliamentary seats.
Members of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly observation
mission have bemoaned the lack of emphasis on public policy, telling
journalists on April 14 that "no significant differences can be found
in the platforms of the candidates and the parties."
"Many perceive this election as a struggle between political elites,
not ideas and principles," said the PACE mission head, Leo Platvoet.
A member of the ruling Republican Party of Armenia’s political council,
MP Armen Ashotian, similarly lamented the lack of political debate. But
he contended that little can change until living standards rise. His
recommendation? Wait for the next parliamentary elections — in 2012.
Gevorg Poghosian, head of the Armenian Sociological Association, said
voters should not be faulted for harboring cynical attitudes toward
the campaign. He pointed to past experience which shows that campaign
promises are rarely kept. "They [potential voters] are simply tired
of hearing about programs that can’t be realized, and understand that
party promises and programs very rarely come true," said Poghosian.
"That is why they prefer making use of the moment and selling their
votes."
Practical considerations often dominate the decision-making process,
said Hrant Movsisian, an 18-year-old student at the Yerevan Fine Arts
College and a resident of Etchmiadzin, a town about 15 kilometers from
Yerevan. "We will give our votes to whomever gives us free buses [to
travel] from Etchmiadzin to Yerevan," he said. One former Republican
Party candidate, already eliminated from the race in Etchmiadzin,
was known for providing such bus rides. [For background see the
Eurasia Insight archive]. Those free fares were crucial for Movsisian
because without them he might not have been able to attend school
in the capital. He explained that his family relies on his mother’s
$50-per-month salary as a kindergarten teacher, making $4-per-day
bus rides to Yerevan for Movsisian and his sister prohibitively
expensive. "Everyone who has a student in the family studying in
Yerevan thinks the same way, because their most important problem is
this [transportation]."
Such handouts — usually termed "acts of charity" — have become
closely associated with the pro-government Prosperous Armenia Party,
which has experienced a meteoric rise in its membership over the
past year. [For details, see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Based
on an early April survey of 2,000 respondents, the British pollster
Populus estimates that the party, little known before last year, now
commands the support of 27 percent of voters, slightly behind the
ruling Republican Party of Armenia which reportedly has 31 percent
of voters’ support.
Party members openly acknowledge that the party’s popularity is closely
linked to the image of its leader, tycoon Gagik Tsarukian, who is
viewed as a deep-pocketed benefactor. The provision of free bus rides
for university students, or the establishment of regional healthcare
clinics merely show that "he is capable of solving the problems and the
social issues of which a significant part of the population complain,"
said Vardan Bostanjian, a Prosperous Armenia candidate.
Runaway corruption is a frequent complaint, and one that some voters
believe requires a wealthy parliamentarian to withstand. A candidate
who shows his wealth is a candidate with no need to rob the state once
elected to parliament, commented 67-year-old retiree Stepan Poghosian.
"Let him [the candidate] be a well-off man, full of everything, not to
think about people’s pensions and allowances, not to fill his pocket
with aid coming from abroad," said Poghosian, whose chief source of
income is a $35 monthly pension. "That’s the reason I will be voting
for the wealthiest person."
One opposition member, however, worries that this mindset, over
the long term, could contribute to the "collapse" of a functioning
democratic political system. "Everyone talks about whose balloon
or poster is larger, whose song is what in the campaign," said Aram
Manukian, a member of the Armenian National Movement. "And people feel
happy when their own stolen money returns to them through bribes,
and [they] qualify it as the candidates’ strong inclination for
benevolent acts."
Nonetheless, voter criteria for what makes a good individual candidate
outside of personal wealth or handouts do exist. Thirty-one percent of
1,200 voters surveyed in 2006 by the Gallup Institute and the Armenian
Sociological Association named a candidate’s honesty and objectivity as
the most important qualifications for election, followed by 30 percent
who cited his or her commitment to democratic values. A high level of
education was desirable for 28 percent of the respondents, while 19
percent cited the candidate’s readiness to care for people’s needs. The
poll was conducted for the International Republican Institute. A
fresh survey by the Gallup Institute in March 2007 showed that those
expectations remain largely unchanged, noted Gallup representative
Rasa Alisauskiene, who trained field workers for the survey.
Editor’s Note: Gayane Abrahamyan is a reporter for the ArmeniaNow
online weekly in Yerevan.